Since his March appointment, Hudson has been unequivocal on the need for New Zealand to conduct thorough, global reconnaissance in an attempt to uncover any overseas players with Kiwi heritage - and potential to play for the All Whites.

Auckland City romped home to take the minor premiership in the league..finals series starts in a couple of weeks after one more round of games.

Got to six of the nine home matches this season...very entertaining with some good players, much too good for this level. It helps I suppose to attract good players when they have a chance in playing something that they normally wouldnt get to......they should easily win the finals series, nobody has come close to beating them since they got back from Morocco.

As for the rest of the league...they would struggle in National League most of them...by the way Waitakere are scum.......some of the dirtiest players I have ever seen....one of them purposely kicked in the back of the leg of a guy coming back from a six month leg injury on top of numerous other incidents....seen them three times this season and they are a bunch of thugs.

Well the Olympic Qualifiers in Oceania (doubling as the Pacific Games) got to a lively start, averaging 16 goals per match.Only one team qualifies and it's probably fair to say it won't be Micronesia.*

Unlike the greedy Australians, there were seven different players with hat-tricks in Tahiti's win.

I see that New Zealand and Australia are competing in the Pacific Games for the first time ever on a trial basis. Is that something that is driven by the soccer Olympic qualifiers (and rugby sevens?) or something else?

In July 2014, the Oceania National Olympic Committees announced their members had voted to allow Australia and New Zealand to participate in four sports, on a provisional basis, in the 2015 Pacific Games. The risk of seeing the two wealthy, developed nations dominate the competition had previously prevented their inclusion. They would be allowed to send participants only in rugby sevens, sailing, taekwondo and weightlifting - sports where other Pacific countries had proved sufficiently competitive against them in the past

Note that the football competition here will have two separate sets of semi-finals following the group stage.

Olympic Qualifying semi-finals will be played on 10 July, final on 12 July.Pacific Games semi-finals will be played 15 July, final 17 July.

Actually, two teams in Group A (Fiji and Vanuatu) qualified for the Olympic semis without playing a match as the opponents they were drawn against are not IOC members (Micronesia and Tahiti).Everyone is eligible for the Pacific Games football semi-finals, except for New Zealand.

nzfooty wrote:Note that the football competition here will have two separate sets of semi-finals following the group stage.

Olympic Qualifying semi-finals will be played on 10 July, final on 12 July.Pacific Games semi-finals will be played 15 July, final 17 July.

Huh? Is it the same group matches that nominally decide qualification for both sets of semis, minus New Zealand etc? So potentially you could win the Olympic Qualifying final and then be too knackered to do well in the Pacific Games semis? That's quite some schizophrenic tournament. I'm surprised Australia don't send a team that is only eligible to play in the group stage (only to demolish everyone and then bow out early). And if New Zealand can potentially win gold in the sailing, taekwondo etc, then why not in the football? It would make things a lot simpler.

I think a place at the Olympics is the bigger of the two prizes so the focus will be on that first. When I saw the scheduling the first thing that came to my mind wasthat most assume NZ will get the Olympic spot, leaving the other top teams to play a consolation tournament for the Pacific Games medals.

As to why football will not be include for NZ and Australia:

sports where other Pacific countries had proved sufficiently competitive against them in the past

Though as Tahiti are the current Oceania champions (and New Caledonia were able to defeat NZ in the semis before losing to Tahiti) you could make the argument that these nations are sufficiently competitive.

I am in New Caledonia at the moment and football is everywhere. Lots of kids in the park and they are all playing it so the French influence is large...heaps of Paris Saint-Germain jerseys around as well.

nzfooty wrote:Though as Tahiti are the current Oceania champions (and New Caledonia were able to defeat NZ in the semis before losing to Tahiti) you could make the argument that these nations are sufficiently competitive.

Given the tropical heat, a bumpy pitch and a partisan crowd then you could argue that most of those sides would have a chance against New Zealand on their day. Didn't Fiji beat them sometime recently too?